José Norton de Matos

Norton de Matos

José Maria Mendes Ribeiro Norton de Matos (born March 23, 1867 in Ponte de Lima , † January 3, 1955 ibid) was a Portuguese general and politician . He was Prime Minister (Presidente do Conselho de Ministros) and temporarily foreign minister (Ministro dos negócios Estrangeiros) several times during the First Republic .

biography

Studies and military career

After completing school in Braga and graduating from the Escola Académica in Lisbon from 1880 to 1884, he began studying mathematics at the University of Coimbra . Subsequently he completed training at the military school ( Escola do Exército ) in Lisbon and as a sub-lieutenant ( Alferes ) in the 4th Cavalry Regiment .

In 1898 he worked for several years until 1907 as an officer in the colonial administration of Portuguese India ( Goa ), where he mainly worked as a director of land surveying .

First World War and First Republic

His return to Portugal coincided with the establishment of the First Portuguese Republic on October 6, 1910. Soon afterwards he took over the post of Chief of Staff of the 5th Division and then Chief of the General Staff. In January 1912 he was appointed Governor General of the Angola Province . as the successor to Manuel Maria Coelho . During his tenure, which lasted until 1915, he was largely responsible for protecting the colony from foreign forces such as Great Britain , the German Empire and France . At the same time, he shaped the understanding of colonial power there .

He then returned to Portugal. As a member of the constitutional junta ( Junta Constitucional ) from 14 to 17 May 1915, he was de facto member of a college of prime ministers (Presidente do Conselho de Ministros) . He then took over the post of Colonial Minister and Minister of War during the First World War from 1915 to 1917 . As such, he was particularly responsible for organizing the Portuguese operation on the Western Front . Due to differences of opinion with the New Republic ( República Nova ) proclaimed by Sidónio Pais on December 8, 1917 and its political orientation, he went into exile in London at the end of 1917 .

After his return later he was a delegate at the Paris Peace Conference in January 1919 , which led to the signing of the Versailles Peace Treaty . He later returned to Angola and served as the first High Commissioner and Governor General of Angola from 1921 to 1923. He was then accredited as an ambassador in London . He held this office until the coup on May 26, 1926.

Military dictatorship and opposition to the Estado Novo

During the military dictatorship from 1926 to 1932, he took over a professorship for mathematics at the Technical University Institute ( Instituto Superior Tecnico ). Like many Portuguese politicians of his time, he was also a supporter of Freemasonry and was elected Grand Master of the Freemasons ( Grande Oriente Lusitano ) in November 1929 , after the originally elected former Prime Minister and President António José de Almeida had died shortly before. When the government enacted a law banning secret societies, he protested on January 31, 1935 at the President of Parliament ( Assembleia da República ), José Alberto dos Reis . After the passage of Law No. 1091 of May 21, 1935 and the ensuing ban on Freemasons, he had to resign from his position as Grand Master.

With the beginning of the regime of António de Oliveira Salazar and the New State ( Estado Novo ) founded by him in 1932, he was recalled from his professorship. In the following years he was elected to one of Salazar's leading opponents and finally in 1943 a member of the National Council of the United National Anti-Fascist Movement ( Movimento de Unidade Nacional Anti-Fascista ).

On his 81st birthday, he was chosen as an opposition candidate for the election of President of Portugal against António Óscar de Fragoso Carmona . As such, in his election manifesto of July 9, 1948, he advocated freedom of election campaigns and election rallies and a conscientious review of the voting results. After this was rejected by the government under Salazar, Norton de Matos resigned as a candidate for the presidential election on February 12, 1949.

Nevertheless, he remained one of the leaders of the democratic opposition movement, the center of which was in the northern Portuguese city of Porto .

Awards

In the course of his military and professional career, Norton de Matos was awarded various Portuguese and foreign medals:

• 1919: Grand Cross of the Order of the Tower and the Sword ( Ordem Militar da Torre e Espada ),
• 1921: Grand Cross of the Order of Avis ( Ordem Militar de São Bento de Aviz ),
• Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George ( Great Britain ),
• Commander of the Order of Christ ( Ordem de Cristo ).

Publications

• Os serviços de agrimensura e cadastro da Índia Portuguesa (Land surveying and cadastral systems in Portuguese India)
• A geologia da Índia Portuguesa (The geology of Portuguese India)
• A província de Angola , 1926 (The Province of Angola)
• Memória e trabalhos da minha vida (4 volumes), 1943–1946 (Memories and works of my life, 4 volumes)
• A Nação una , 1953 (One Nation)

Web links

• Biography (portuguese)
• Castelo, Cláudia: José Norton: Norton de Matos - Biografia: Fronteiras do Tempo . Lisbon 2002, book review in Análise Social, 2004
• Falconer, Don: A Shortened History of Freemansonry in Portugal
• Biographical information in rulers.org

Individual evidence

1. ^ List of Governors General of Angola from 1837 to 1921
2. ↑ Bea Gomes: O munde quer o português criou - On the invention of a lusophonic world . ( Memento of the original from January 10, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Samples - Vienna Journal for Critical African Studies, 2001, p. 34 (PDF file; 51 kB) 
3. ^ High Commissioners and Governors General of Angola 1921–1975
4. ↑ Offices of Norton de Matos with the Freemasons ( Memento of the original of November 4, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
5. ^ Daniel Bastos: Para uma História Eleições Presidenciais de 1949 e 1958 na Vila de Fafe . ( Memento of the original from May 29, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
6. ^ Election manifesto of July 9, 1948

predecessor	Office	successor
Joaquim Pimenta de Castro	Constitutional Junta (Junta Constitucional) May 14, 1915 - May 17, 1915	José de Castro